Breaking the Law; Healing the Sick

Stepping up in a crowd to take action can move us out of our comfort zone, but at the same time it stretches you and builds your confidence for even greater things than these. This idea of stretching ourselves is woven through the scriptures and especially what Mark is telling us in the Gospel. Paul gives us more than just a hint about the need to change things up in today’s Epistle. But of course it all begins with Moses telling us that one day there will be Prophet raised up by God to show us the way.
Moses makes the promise, Mark gives proof that the promise has been fulfilled, and Paul demonstrates a way in which we respond. Now to get us into the main storyline of Jesus’s actions in the synagogue performing this exorcism, let’s reflect on what we know about Mark. We know the text attributed to him was the first gospel ever recorded. We know it is not a text on morals or ethics such as can be said of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. The fact that he omits what some consider the core of Jesus’s message: the sermons on the mount and the plain; shows us that we’re hearing about what Jesus does more than what he says. It is a story that includes as much history as it does theology. It is a story that sets out to tell us that Jesus was not someone who reverently sat in the pews during service. He was someone that grabbed our attention when we least expected. And He was someone who would rather break a rule for the sake of saving a leper than to blindly obey laws that had long lost their true value.
Mark is personally one who knew Peter and Paul and had not only the firsthand knowledge of Jesus’s authority on earth through their teachings, but also witnessed that authority through the healing miracles performed by those two Saints. We can see through Mark what Jesus did during his time with them, and so he sets the tone of Jesus’s ministry by beginning with an exorcism. These are some very tricky versus for our time and place – where a watered-down Christianity wants to make everything more comfortable for us by maybe trying to replace the word ‘demon’ with ‘illness’; or even by saying that these readings are all metaphors. But if we try to explain away the images and written words that appear here as some Grimm Fairy Tale, we will completely lose what Mark is trying to tell us.
Mark wants to show us that Jesus is not just another teacher, another rabbi in the community. He is one who has authority. He doesn’t just walk into a place all calm and collective, read a few scrolls, say what’s on his mind, and sit down without raising even the slightest eyebrow. Because Jesus has what has never been seen before; the authority of God, the meeting just got a little more exciting. Let’s compare images of how things might have gone before and after His arrival. The scribes are in the synagogue reading the scrolls, then maybe go off on some long, boring sermon about what they think it means. Or maybe they’ve already had their discussion beforehand in the form of Midrash and are giving the people their findings. Everyone shakes their head and nods, exchange some handshakes, sit down and break bread and drink some wine and go home to feed the cattle and tend the sheep.
Jesus walks in and it’s his turn to read. He stands up, takes a scroll, reads and then begins to teach a new teaching. He starts interpreting the words in ways which they hadn’t heard before and now are finally making sense. Instead of people nodding to be nice and mumbling in unison, they’re applauding the words and gasping at the fresh air. Mark uses the word ‘immediately’ throughout his book. In most translations where modern writers frown on using the same word over and over again they wind up replacing this with other words that may just lose some of the intensity such as ‘at that time’, or ‘then’. There is a reason for Mark’s selection of adverbs and this one is to set a rhythm and tone to the events as they unfold. He wants to show the impact Jesus has on people. And impact them he does, for two other words he uses over and over are ‘astounded’ and ‘amazed’. They are always astounded and amazed at what Jesus has done.
What we can draw from this so far is that first, we are to be sure that Jesus teaches with authority, unlike the scribes. He came not to read, but to teach! And his teachings were alive and fresh… think about that… what it would be like to sit down in church and have someone preaching for hours and you are so rapt up in this person’s ideas and presentation that you completely forget about your Sunday pot roast simmering in the oven. (Remember those days?) The pot roast – not the sermons. Secondly, we can see that his authority stretches out beyond the confines of a stone building, beyond the words he speaks, beyond our wildest dreams because he has complete command and control over evil… something that up to this point only God had control over.
But what about Paul’s letter? How might that tie into the idea of being in control of instead of being controlled? Paul’s lesson is one that deals with the moral and ethical problem of doing something that is legal and okay with us, yet might cause another harm. For example, I know of a few alcoholics and drug addicts. Exchange meat for alcohol in Paul’s letter and you can see what he’s saying. I would not invite an alcoholic to a party where wine, beer and liquor was being consumed by everyone else without letting him know that up front. To have him show up unaware could be more temptation than he could handle and I could be liable for sending him back into rehab. Another example of this is a real life case that just happened in Paris with the Charlie newspaper. Do we have freedom to print what we want? Here in the western world, yes. But before we make something public, perhaps we might want to consider what the consequences will be if people radically disagree with our thoughts. Just because something is legal to do doesn’t mean it should always be done. Paul tells us it’s our responsibility to look out for the greater good in all we do.
Which is another vein of thought we get from the gospel. We can easily infer that people who were possessed with demons (or were ill, sick, dying, hungry, homeless, etc.), these people had previously sat around on the perimeter of the crowd and yet had been ignored by the rest of society. Nobody turned to them when they cried out. Nobody asked how they could help. Nobody ventured into that safe space between themselves and the ones in need because most everyone has a fear of the unknown. This is more of the wilderness we spoke of last week. The wilderness that Jesus walked into after being baptized. It’s were we all need to go. And nobody dared to go there then and few dare these days. They – we – just sit pretending to be comfortable and not take notice. Everyone except for Jesus.
Yes, they sat back and ignored everything around them. When we sit back ignoring what’s wrong in the world and allow evil to be evil we give it power. Jesus refused to allow evil to have power over him and with him in our lives we can be sure it has no power over us. But if we don’t stand up to what is wrong and turn it away, if we sit back and say “nope, that’s none of my business, let someone else take care of it” we are just like the scribes who told the same old story time after time after time. To do nothing about a situation allows the problem to persist and more than likely get worse.
Jesus knew the needs of others then as he knows the needs of others now. Through Mark, he shows us that not only is he a talented teacher of morals and ethics, but he shows us that he also has the authority to make all things right. Do we have the courage and strength to do what is necessary to stand up to evil in the world, no matter how it presents itself? Do we know and trust that as Christ’s own, we have his authority at our beck and call whenever we need it? It continues to be one of those call and response situations we encounter during this time after Epiphany, and that we talked about last week. However in this case, it just might be that we are the ones who are calling to Jesus for His response and authority in a time we may need it most. So will we call and be amazed and astounded at the result? Or will we sit around nodding our heads and mumbling with the crowd? Let’s hope we can tell everyone how amazed we were at the power and authority of Jesus! Amen. Peace! Deacon Pete